Development of an automated Moon observation system using the ALTS-07 Robotic Telescope: 2. Progress report on standard contrast enhancement of Moon crescent image with OpenCV

Vision is a continuous two-dimensional (2-D) image that can be perceived by human visual system. Mathematically, image is a 2-D function that expresses the intensity of light. This research introduces the fundamental ideas of computer vision. We used OpenCV (Open-Source Computer Vision) to solve automatic image processing techniques, especially enhancement of contrast crescent visibility. We described an image using feature vectors to characterize and numerically to quantify the contents of an image. Then, we compared several techniques for increasing image quality, such as Basic contrast, Binary thresholding, Otsu thresholding, Histogram equalization, and Adaptive Histogram equalization. Finally, we calculated the statistical features of the image before and after enhancement process, and also decided to choose the best enhancement technique that will be implemented on a self-constructed cascade classifier in the future.